There's a way to save hedgehogs – and all of us can help | Hugh Warwick

By taking part in projects such as counting hedgehog homes, ordinary people enable scientists to understand and protect Britain's much-loved wildlife

Today sees the launch of the "hedgehog housing census". All over the country, thousands of people are going to the trouble and expense of building or buying hedgehog homes. We want to know how important this is to the lives of one of our most loved animals - and how we can improve the way we help hedgehogs in the future.

For a hedgehog scientist - and believe me, there are such things - gathering the volume of information required to make this a meaningful study cannot be done alone. They would need to get into thousands of gardens, assess the structures, what they are made of, where they are situated. They would also need to see what other features the garden had that might encourage hedgehogs, such as access. One of the key messages from our Hedgehog Street campaign is the necessity to make small holes, around the size of a CD case, at the bottom of fences and walls to allow the animals to roam.